


Breath

by Jane St Clair (3jane)



Category: Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Genre: Canonical Character Death, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-09
Updated: 2011-08-09
Packaged: 2017-10-22 10:14:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/236995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3jane/pseuds/Jane%20St%20Clair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mostly dead.  Mostly dead we can do something about!<br/>On Naboo, after the war, Obi-Wan is ready to demand an answer.<br/>Sequel to "Carefully Everywhere Descending."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breath

**Author's Note:**

> Obi-Wan's meditations are adapted from the Buddhist text The  
> *Dhammapada*. Neither my changes (minimal) nor my use of the  
> text in this work is intended to be disrespectful.

***  
those years contained a lot of breathing, and I am not young.  
in all those years you are not the first  
to take my breath away, but you are  
the first to give it back.  
          -- from "politics and sex (1): breathe"  
         by Candas Jane Dorsey  
***

Deep silence.

He remembered other times that he'd woken slowly, raising his  
head finally from a lover's chest to catch as much as he could  
of the rising light.  The smell of his partner's body had  
always been the first thing to register with him.  Even before  
he reached out with the Force in that split second that  
confirmed identity, the smell would be on them, on him, on the  
bedclothes and the pillows.  He'd spent a few dawns like that,  
pillowed against close friends, reaching to the flat grey that  
seemed to colour the first light on every planet he'd visited.    
For the first minutes, there would be no colour at all.  Then  
it would seep through, and he would be able to distinguish his  
skin's subtle tones from his partner's.  Only when he was  
steady and breathing, and it was fully morning, would he lay  
back down and bury his face in that chest, feeling for the  
steadiness of breathing and the heartbeat that would rise like  
a Force pulse under his cheek.

They weren't really blankets, around him.  It was only his own  
robe, pulled close, but he'd slept under it before.  The floor  
against him was frighteningly cold.  He almost wasn't  
breathing; his listening had become more important.  He was  
going to be able to recognize the first sound.  Until even the  
silence made him shakingly nauseous and he started to talk.

"I never told you about my first lover.  A woman.  Her name was  
Hanen.  We were on Altisyne, you remember, to negotiate between  
the dockers' union and the merchant traders, and you gave me  
the night off.  I met her in cafe where I was reading.  She was  
. . . I don't . . . she was older than I was.  She asked me  
what I was reading, and I told her, and she started an argument  
with me over it.  Something small, the significance of an  
essayist I liked.  I wasn't dressed as a Jedi, you understand.    
She ordered us dinner.  We were still arguing when the owners  
began putting up chairs for the night, so she invited me back  
to her rooms.  I don't think we ever stopped talking.  Her flat  
was very old-fashioned, not heavily furnished, and I remember  
that nearly everything was painted white.  I was curled up on  
her bed and explaining my opinions on the value of  
autobiographies, I think, when she leaned over and kissed me.    
I was very surprised, but she was . . . fascinating, and it  
felt good.  And then she settled me back against her pillows  
and made love to me.  I never did anything more active than  
kiss her."

He felt the corner of his mouth twitch.  He wondered how much  
guilt he should feel that he couldn't immediately remember her  
eye colour or the depth of her loveliness.  "A year ago, I  
passed her in a space port.  I was travelling with you.  She  
stopped me and gave me a coloured glass drop, and kissed me on  
the mouth.  It took me almost a minute to realize who she was,  
and I was surprised that she recognized me at all.  You shouted  
something to me and I turned to answer you, and when I looked  
back, she wasn't there."

Very faintly, he could hear the metal workings of the hangar.    
Voices distantly and hands touching things.

"I didn't shape my entire life around you.  Even a year ago I  
had other lovers.  I know you know that.  I remember coming in  
after sunrise with someone's face paint still all over me, and  
you only raised you eyebrows and jerked your chin at the  
bathroom.  And you handed me tea when I came out and we carried  
on that day just as if I'd slept in the same room with you all  
night."

And it still smelled like ozone and blood.  The skin-edge that  
was metal on metal.  The body against his.

"I've loved you since I was a child.  You know that too."

He knew what he must look like, a small, stocky man curled like  
a child's toy against that rangy body.  He had only left once,  
for a handful of minutes, to retrieve their discarded cloaks  
and make up this pretense of a bed.

"Please, Qui-Gon.  I need you to breathe."

If he reached up with his mind just a little, he could feel the  
night, black pitching into a few lights, then a hundred, a  
thousand.

He shifted himself up just enough to support the big face with  
both hands and kiss it, then settled himself again against the  
uninjured shoulder.

A million billion stars.  Nebulae.  Origins.

He was aware of it the instant the big heart under his palm  
started beating again.  He wasn't prepared for the small  
shifting of his own body as the chest under him recommenced  
breathing.  The shock was a heavier one than he would have  
expected, and he found himself shaking for long minutes, long  
enough to assure himself that the breathing would continue.    
And then buried his face in his Master's shoulder and slept.

***

A touch on his shoulder, too delicate.

"Jedi Kenobi."

Amidala.  He knew the smell of her, velvet and white musk,  
traced it with a fragment of Force-thought.  He pushed up to  
face her the way he would have the light, easing carefully away  
from the body against him, and showing only his face.  When he  
gave her his attention, she reached out a hand and brushed his  
temple.  He must have had a bruise there, because he flinched  
away from the pain automatically, and she pulled back.

She was still in her bare-faced handmaiden guise.  When she was  
fully painted, it was too easy for him to forget that she was a  
little girl, but Anakin had latched onto her as someone safe,  
who was nearly of his own age.  He knew intellectually that she  
was beautiful, but the eyes on him were a child's eyes, and he  
only wanted to hide from them.  He'd killed something awful,  
and he'd been terribly angry when he'd done it.  Some small  
part of him was gibbering from the power of that emotion, but  
the largest part of him was simply exhausted.  In the first  
seconds after Qui-Gon's death, he'd poured so much energy into  
his Master's body that he'd been honestly shocked that his own  
heart had continued beating.

He could feel Qui-Gon at the fringes of his mind, a distant,  
living force.  As he gradually oriented himself, he became  
aware of the simple palace room, the bed under him, his own  
belly-down sprawl on it.  Even more slowly he realized that he  
was bare to the waist and that his shoulders ached horribly.    
Reflexively, he arched up, stretching the muscles and working  
blood and Force energy through them.

He hissed a little as the worst of the pain eased, and gathered  
himself.  By gently twisting himself he was able to sit cross-  
legged while still covering himself with the sheet.  If it was  
possible, he wanted not to shock the queen further.  From that  
position he bowed to her as best he could.

"Highness."

"I'm sorry, Jedi Kenobi, I didn't mean for you to get up," she  
said softly.  A pause.  "How do you feel?"

If he hadn't been so tired, he would have generated a  
diplomatic answer.  As it was, he couldn't generate anything  
more distinct than, "Hurts."

"The healers thought you must have fallen.  Your whole back was  
bruised."

She half-reached to touch him again, then withdrew and buried  
the hand in a fold of her robe.  For half a minute, Obi-Wan was  
mystified.  Only when he realized that she was nearly scarlet  
did he glance down and realize how nearly naked, and how much  
older he was than the girl in front of him.  While her eyes  
were averted, he pulled the sheet more closely around and under  
himself, and drew his knees up against his chest so that he was  
a little more concealed, at least.

With her face still lowered, Amidala said, "Anakin would like  
to see you."

Her presence suddenly struck him as odd.  There was no reason,  
if they were safe, for her to move about as a servant.  "I am  
honoured at your presence, Highness, but does the Queen carry  
messages now?"  It was as much a query as to their situation as  
it was a tease.

"I go where I want, Jedi Kenobi.  The healers were reluctant to  
allow Anakin in, but they did not quite have the courage to  
refuse the queen.  I told Anakin I would see you."

She raised her eyes, then, and looked him over frankly.  Obi-  
Wan had rarely been appraised so openly, even in port city  
taverns.  The look lasted only a handful of moments, and he  
would almost have thought he had imagined it if not for the  
fragments of adolescent lust that he could feel in the space  
between them.  His sense of it must have showed in his face,  
because she laughed gently, breaking off the emotion.  The  
expression she turned on him afterwards was extraordinarily  
mature, and it occurred to him that he liked this girl very  
much.  He wondered how many years it would be until she would  
turn that expression on Anakin, and how many more it would be  
before the boy recognized the preciousness of it.

"If the healers will permit it," he told her, "I would be  
pleased to see Anakin as well."  His body hurt, but he didn't  
think he could sleep again, and nothing but that or mediation  
would heal him.

She stepped to the door and spoke quietly with someone behind  
it.  While she was not demanding his attention, Obi-Wan reached  
across his apprenticeship bond to his Master.  He could feel  
the man sleeping, just below the surface of consciousness, and  
barely dreaming.  Fragmentary images came to him, but they were  
only the soft babble of a subconscious mind touching the Force,  
neither nightmare nor love-dream.  He sent his relief across,  
and something almost answered him, then shifted to a half-dream  
of reading in the library on Coruscant.

When he surfaced, Anakin was hovering several feet from him,  
hands behind him and shoulders down.  Amidala was there, Obi-  
Wan could feel her, but she was out of his line of sight, and  
not immediate.  

Obi-Wan extended one hand a little, half an invitation to this  
strange, small creature whom his Master had adopted.  Anakin  
took it after a long consideration, and used it as a lever to  
clamber up on the bed facing the older man.

"I blew up the ship."  It was a kind of offering, a  
conversational opening between two people who had little in  
common beyond the Force and Qui-Gon Jinn.

"Did you?"

"Uh-huh."  Obi-Wan smiled a little and cocked his head.  It was  
all the invitation the boy needed; he chattered until the pain  
rising back up Obi-Wan's consciousness drove him to nearly  
convulsive shivering.

From the corner, Amidala said, "Ani, we should let Jedi Kenobi  
rest."

Anakin clasped Obi-Wan's hand in a trader's grip, then added a  
second hand against the back of it.  Obi-Wan added his left  
hand as well, swallowing the boy's extremity completely for a  
moment, and then let him go.  Afterwards, lying in the half-  
dark, Obi-Wan contemplated the oddness of that touch and his  
own aching gratitude that he might not have to train the small  
being that he only barely understood.

***

He came in carrying Anakin.  The boy wasn't cuddly as Obi-Wan  
had been at that age, begging praise and attention wherever he  
could get it, but he was starved for physical affection in his  
mother's absence, and Obi-Wan suspected that the boy would  
accept comfort from anyone willing to receive him.  There were  
possibilities inherent in that that Obi-Wan didn't like to  
consider, but the only thing that had come of that need thus  
far was a small boy riding Obi-Wan piggy-back through the early  
afternoon light of the palace.

It still hurt.  Obi-Wan's battered shoulders were nearly  
healed, but the last of the damage only repaired itself at the  
rate of a normal human body.  The twinges were reminders of his  
own stubborn mortality, something else he didn't want to  
consider.

Inside Qui-Gon's room, he swung the boy down and watched him go  
and kneel beside the Jedi master's bed.  Qui-Gon spoke quietly  
to him, then reached out and combed his fingers through the  
straw-blond hair.  Anakin ducked and got up, walked around Obi-  
Wan and vanished out the door.  The door closing behind him  
made only the faintest of sounds.  The two remaining men stayed  
like that, watching each other quietly while the sunlight  
angled in the windows and soaked around their legs.

Obi-Wan said, "The Council is here."

"How many?"

"All of them.  The thing we killed was a Sith.  They're  
concerned."

Silence.

"He likes you," Qui-Gon said.

"Who?"

"Anakin."

"I should hope so.  He's been using me for climbing practice  
all day.  I'm going to be forced to deposit him in the  
reflecting pond shortly."  At Qui-Gon's gesture, he folded  
himself onto the bed and sat cross-legged.

"That should be interesting.  I wonder if he has enough Force  
control to levitate himself out."

"I don't know.  Perhaps I should leave it to the Master as an  
exercise."

Obi-Wan couldn't remember how long ago he'd gained the audacity  
to tease his Master, but it had long since become a buffer for  
the rough edges each of them possessed.  His sense of humour  
was wry and a little dangerous and it was only in Qui-Gon's  
presence that it constituted affection.

He knew enough of Qui-Gon's body language to recognize the  
small invitation in the other man's posture.  Only a handful of  
years ago, he would have accepted it instantly and curled  
himself against that rangy, spiced warmth.  A season ago, even,  
he would have moved close enough to touch.  As it was, Obi-Wan  
kept to his place and quietly, letting slow affection roll  
across the master-apprentice bond while the light bands on the  
floor lengthened and finally converted themselves into shadows.    
By early twilight, Qui-Gon was sitting upright and facing him,  
nearly meditational.

It was into that silence that Obi-Wan leaned, catching his  
Master's lips and kissing them, then pulling back and rising.

"The Council are ready to knight me," he said.  "They concluded  
that the death of the Sith was my Test.  The ceremony will be  
held when you are strong enough to attend."

Softly, "Obi-Wan."

"The palace gardens are magnificent," he continued.  "When you  
feel strong enough, come and find me."

***

The core gardens were pristine, even in the aftermath of the  
war, as though the invaders had simply had no interest in them.    
The reflecting pond was here, headed by a piece of crystalline  
abstract art.  Beyond that, a series of hedges created  
occasional clearings, some suitable for state galas and others  
only tiny.  Almost a maze.  On the other side of that was  
stonework, and rougher parkland beyond.  

(*O let us live in joy, in love amongst those who hate!  Among  
those who hate, let us live in love.*)

What was perhaps more wonderful were the side gardens.  These  
were surrounded by flat-sided, unelaborate wooden fences that  
rose to more than human height.  Little enough vegetation, but  
what there was, was carefully shaped and set in contrast to  
large stones and fine gravel or sand, all arranged with an  
attention to the living Force that a Jedi could admire and even  
envy.  In his time wandering the palace grounds, Obi-Wan had  
found three such.  The farthest out had been neglected,  
probably for a long time.  In addition to the plant life and  
rock, it held a small, irregularly-sided pool that in the  
fading daylight had been almost mirror-black.  He thought  
perhaps the space had been created in the time when the Naboo  
had understood their symbiotic relationship with the water-  
dwellers of their planet.

(*O let us live in joy, in health amongst those who are ill!    
Amongst those who are ill, let us live in health.*)

He came back to this place to meditate.  It was after dark, but  
there was a torch bracket in the garden wall, and even a small  
flame caught the water and gave him an amazing light.  

(*O let us live in joy, in peace amongst those who struggle!    
Amongst those who struggle, let us live in peace.*)

He was grateful to be alone.  Without Anakin or Amidala, but  
also with Qui-Gon.  The man's presence was intense, to the  
point that he sometimes wondered if it would devour him.  When  
he'd been a child, that charisma had been something within  
which he could make himself invisible and be safe; when he'd  
been a teenager, it had been the focal point of his adolescent  
lust.  In five or six years, Anakin would love Qui-Gon like  
that.

(*O let us live in joy, although having nothing!  In joy let us  
live like spirits of light!*)

Obi-Wan's own feelings for his master had been the subject of  
half a hundred meditations in the last two or three years.  He  
hadn't had any desire to re-live his first infatuation.  But  
this was something else, less omnipresent and less shattering,  
but felt with all the intensity of his adult mind.  And it was  
love, for Qui-Gon as a person rather than a symbol.  As the one  
who rubbed Obi-Wan's back when he couldn't sleep, but also as a  
man he was just coming to know, whose silences absorbed him and  
whose pride would always keep him from taking on a desperate  
lover.

(*If you find a man who is constant, awake to the inner light,  
learned, long-suffering, endowed with devotion, a noble man --  
follow this good and great man even as a moon follows the path  
of the stars.*)

The back of his head tingled a little with the absence of his  
ponytail.  He'd cut it off when his knighthood had become a  
certainty.  The padawan braid was still there; its removal was  
ceremonial, and afterwards either he or his master would likely  
keep it.  The rest was just hair, a caste-symbol within the  
temple.  It was only the strangeness of being without it that  
made him unbalanced.

(*For hate is not conquered by hate: hate is conquered by love.    
This is a law eternal.*)

He could Qui-Gon's eyes on him, the expression in them strange,  
as though he were evaluating a slightly different person than  
the one he had expected.  Even in the deep stillness of his  
meditations, Obi-Wan had been able to feel his Master coming,  
had been totally aware of his entrance into the closed garden.    
There was no urgency in the living Force around him or in his  
Master's presence, so he let himself surface gradually, coming  
back to a full awareness of the space, the water, the small  
stones, the patterns of light and dark.

"The meditation on joy," Qui-Gon said.

"Yes."

"How did you do with it?"

"Well.  Thank you."  He rose, stretched briefly, and stood a  
moment facing his Master.  Then stepped past the larger man out  
of the enclosed space.  Qui-Gon extinguished the torch and  
followed him.  Outside, the garden was liquid.  The hedges  
towered over even Qui-Gon and muttered softly in the small  
wind.  

One of Qui-Gon's silences emerged in the course of their walk.    
By the time they reached the reflecting pool, the stillness had  
extended to the air around them and the leaves that they  
passed.  It was a stillness reflected in the palace.  In the  
few weeks since they had retaken the capital, the silence after  
dark had been extraordinary, as if the people were still afraid  
to surface.  Even in the midst of the open celebration with the  
Gungans, everything had been clean and still again by dusk.    
Now, a little after midnight, the palace was deeply asleep, and  
the city beyond it was disturbed only by the punctuating  
torches.

In the colonnade at the edge of the palace proper, he stopped,  
a step earlier than seemed natural, so that Qui-Gon's momentum  
carried the larger man into him a little.  When Obi-Wan turned,  
his Master's robes were close enough to his face that he could  
have inhaled through the cloth.  In the instant after that,  
Qui-Gon's arms came around him and drew him close, rocking Obi-  
Wan gently back and forth, undemandingly.  He could have stayed  
like that all night, buried in the Qui-Gon-smell and the  
layered warmth.  It was safe enough in that embrace for him to  
release the deep concentration of his meditations and lean  
unthinkingly into the touch.  Completely safe for him to lift  
his face when he felt ready and open his mouth to his teacher's  
kiss.  Simple and very slow.  There was a question in the  
contact that he took careful time to process and answer.

*do you want me, Obi-Wan?   as master or as a man?   is this  
done for the right reasons?*

He could have answered yes instantly, but the intensity  
demanded some consideration of him.  When the caress ended,  
Obi-Wan pulled back enough to see the face of the person he'd  
kissed, consciously looking for the man he was coming to  
realize was under the surface of his hero.  Lines around the  
blue eyes, greying brown hair, and an awareness of both these  
things.

He stepped back, leaving the embrace and taking only Qui-Gon's  
hand with him.  Moved until the column was at his back.  From  
that vantage, he could see the light across Qui-Gon's face  
when he raised the palm to his lips and kissed it, then licked  
the place where his lips had rested.  What he gained from that  
view reminded him of sitting in the garden and focussing on a  
flowering plant to feel all its small joy in its growth.

"I am not your student anymore, Qui-Gon Jinn.  Let me be your  
lover."

And saw the closed energy of the living thing in front of him  
explode.  He had half a second's view of Qui-Gon's pure joy  
before his teacher's control clamped down, and the view of half  
a smile before the mystic, mysterious expression reasserted  
itself.  

When he moved away, Qui-Gon followed him, releasing his hand  
and stepping up to walk beside him so that in the still palace  
they were only two robed and hooded Jedi pacing soundlessly  
through the halls.  Once he stopped, pressed his open hands to  
a door so that he could feel Anakin sleeping, comfortably  
buried in a pile of royal-crested blankets.  The boy was  
already so much the queen's pet, whoever taught the child would  
have to fight her for his attention.

And finally his own chamber.  It was nearly bare: only the bed,  
a table and chair, and the fire bowls in each corner.  The  
fires hadn't been lit when he'd gone out, but sometime in the  
night a servant must have come in to stoke them, because the  
metal braziers all radiated a penetrating and immediate warmth.    
There was nothing else in the room: no hangings, no curtains,  
none of the monolithic sculptural art he'd come to associate  
with the palace's design.  Amidala's perception of what was  
appropriate for Jedi, perhaps.  He couldn't begrudge her it,  
though, not even the curtains: the windows that ran along the  
one side of his room were nearly floor-to-ceiling, and  
uncovered they gave an enormous view of the gardens.

Qui-Gon's lips were the most immediate reminder of his  
presence.  A moment after Obi-Wan had stilled, they had settled  
behind his ear, mouthing the short hair delicately.  He went  
absolutely still in the face of that contact.  Qui-Gon's hands  
came around him, ran up his chest and down to his waist, and he  
was almost naked before he realized that the touch had some  
purpose other than to give pleasure.

His bare shoulders were so pale that Obi-Wan was sure he must  
glow in the dark.  Even leaving the pallor of his skin, there  
was so much Force-energy coursing through him that he felt  
dangerously electric.  And electric was the way Qui-Gon handled  
him, like something that might give an unexpected static shock.    
Steady, careful.  Grounded.  But always with Qui-Gon's mouth  
on his neck or running across his shoulders, always with Qui-  
Gon's fingers dipping below the waistband of his leggings.

When he turned himself fully into that embrace, he was already  
naked.  His clothing and boots and all his tools were pooled  
around him on the floor.  Qui-Gon absorbed him, kissing gently  
along his hairline and stroking the outlines of muscles in his  
back.  So good.  He would have been willing to simply climb the  
man, kiss him breathless, and then allow himself to be taken  
against the wall.  Instead he stripped his Master of everything  
but his leggings and knelt, kissing the bared flesh of the  
lower belly and the still-clothed skin that stretched over the  
narrow hips.  So easy to unlace the boots while he was down  
there, rubbing his cheek against the rough fabric.  Even easier  
to slide the leggings down and bury his face in the dark hair  
that he exposed.

He only got up when Qui-Gon pulled at him.  His Master's hands  
were big enough that any part of him they touched simply  
disappeared.  Enormous hands turned him and guided him to the  
bed, settled him on the edge of it.  Qui-Gon slid in behind  
him, settled on his back, and caught Obi-Wan again, pulling the  
younger man until he was lying on top, cradled by his Master's  
body.  The position didn't demand any effort from Obi-Wan at  
all.  He was held completely; all he had to do was raise his  
head a little and Qui-Gon could kiss him indefinitely.

He could have stayed like that all night.  Desire was steaming  
in the deeper parts of his body, but even this was more  
intimate than anything he'd had with this man before.  And  
underneath all his confidence, there was still the child who  
wanted to be held and kissed.  In this night, he'd been kissed  
deeply three, maybe four times; otherwise, Qui-Gon's lips had  
only feathered over him or brushed his, sometimes shifting so  
their noses rubbed.  Except for their nudity, there was  
something terribly innocent in their contact.

He'd spent too many nights like this, hovering on the edge of  
full sexuality, to accept the gentle and undemanding affection  
between them now.  Obi-Wan reached over his Master's shoulder  
and palmed the bottle hidden under the pillows, pressed it into  
Qui-Gon's hand with a look that was more than a request.    
Faintly, he could feel the Force shifting as Qui-Gon opened the  
vessel without lifting his second hand from Obi-Wan's back.    
The oil dripped from the open hand onto his skin.  Obi-Wan  
shifted briefly, bringing his knees to the outside of Qui-Gon's  
legs and pushing them forward so that he was as spread as he  
could manage in his current posture.

The push of Qui-Gon's first slicked finger against his anus was  
enough to shatter his concentration completely.  Unable to  
sustain his kisses, Obi-Wan dropped his head into the crook of  
Qui-Gon's neck and shoulder and concentrated on breathing while  
the pressure built, first gently, then very hard, until a  
single push drove the finger in past the second knuckle.  Big,  
bigger than he'd thought, for all the times that he'd noticed  
Qui-Gon's enormous hands on him.  Even with that minimal  
contact he was whimpering and trembling.

"Shhh, my Obi-Wan.  Relax, it's all right."

He did, gradually.  Qui-Gon's finger in him was very still, and  
the lips pressed against the top of his head were as steadying  
as anything he could imagine.  Finally, the touch shifted just  
a little, and an almost blinding pleasure ran through him.    
Riding the crest of that pleasure, he was able to raise his  
head again and kiss and be kissed.

Qui-Gon stretched him carefully, waiting for a long time at two  
fingers until Obi-Wan knew he was whimpering for more.  Three  
fingers were unreasonably huge, and they went deeper than he  
could have expected.  Very briefly, a fourth nudged him, and by  
then he was begging out loud.  Qui-Gon withdrew completely,  
then, and when the fingers came back it was only to oil the  
younger man thoroughly.

The next time he shifted, Obi-Wan's whole awareness became  
focussed on the erection rising just behind him.  If he'd been  
a larger man, their position would never have worked; as it  
was, he could push down just a little and let the crease of his  
buttocks cradle the hard flesh, and rub against it.

"Oh Force, my Obi-Wan, *yes*!"

And there was nothing protective in that voice.  When Obi-Wan  
sat up and rose to his knees, the big hands running over him  
were less careful than insistent.  Even in the almost  
nonexistent light, he could make out desperate lines cutting  
themselves across the older man's face.  He reached with both  
hands and locked Qui-Gon's in his.  The touch transferred  
enough oil on his skin that he was slick by the time he let one  
hand go and reached back to lubricate Qui-Gon's erection.  He  
kept his hand there, bracing the too-hot hardness, while he  
found his balance just above the big body, braced himself, and  
sank down, impaling himself.

Obi-Wan had never in his life taken anyone this deep.  He'd  
slid his knees far apart, taking his Master so deeply that he  
was resting against the man's thighs.  After that, it was long  
minutes before he could do anything but tremble, braced against  
Qui-Gon's hands and holding himself in place with simple will.

It hurt, but he'd been expecting that.  His stillness let the  
pain run through him and dissipate, given over to the Force.    
What came after it was hot, stabbing pleasure, of being  
stretched and penetrated, of the love that underlaid that  
touch.  Qui-Gon was whispering to him, words he couldn't make  
out, but the sound was reassuring.  It was that sound that gave  
him the strength he needed to move, pushing up and letting  
himself slide down, once, twice.  

He needed this.  Qui-Gon's hands holding his, letting him drive  
up and down until he exhausted himself, then the soft voice  
telling him not to worry, guiding him into a gentle rocking  
motion that worked off the strength of his Master's grip.  Less  
urgent, but no less intense.  He could feel Qui-Gon shifting  
deep inside him, could feel the pleasure coursing just under  
the man's skin.  Once, the other man tried to break the grip  
and reach for him, but Obi-Wan held on, riding a little faster  
and then squeezing hard.

"Love you, Master.  Absolutely."

He could feel Qui-Gon's orgasm rising, and he rode it out,  
letting the wet heat pulse into him and keeping his motions  
steady until all the tension was gone from the big body under  
his and even the enormous hands had relaxed their grip.  And  
even then he waited, just enjoying the penetration until the  
cock inside him softened.  When it slid out of him, he let  
himself nearly collapse, and dismount, settling beside the  
slack warmth of his Master.  By resting his head on Qui-Gon's  
chest, he could feel both the man's heartbeat and his steady  
breathing.

Gradually, one arm wrapped around his shoulders and Qui-Gon  
roused himself.  By that time, Obi-Wan's own cock was achingly  
hard.  He hadn't been willing to spare enough concentration  
from his partner's pleasure to let himself come before, and the  
resulting tension had run completely through his body before  
resettling in his groin.  Even now he wasn't prepared to  
disturb the quiet between them, but he was so hard it almost  
hurt, and he couldn't help shifting against the warm flesh  
pressed against him.

Softly, "Obi-Wan, you didn't . . ."

"Don't worry about it."

Qui-Gon snorted.  "You *are* joking."  He rolled suddenly and  
locked his lips over Obi-Wan's, more aggressively than he had  
all night.  "You," he said, "are a terrible tease.  Holding  
yourself in front of me like that and then not letting me touch  
you."  Licked Obi-Wan's chest and belly, circling his tongue  
around the shallow pool of the younger man's navel.  When he  
shifted again, it was to bring his mouth level with man's  
erection.  Obi-Wan had a half-glimpse of him before he bent and  
closed his mouth around the tip, and it was so incredibly good,  
so wet and he needed this so badly . . .

"No!"

Qui-Gon released him and turned to look Obi-Wan in the eye, but  
didn't raise his head.  "Shh, love.  What is it?"

"I . . ."  And how was he supposed to explain this?  "I . . . I  
love your hands.  Could you . . . ?  Please?"

Laughter chuffing against his skin.  "If it pleases you."  Qui-  
Gon straightened and rearranged them swiftly, so that Obi-Wan  
was almost completely surrounded by the larger man, with his  
shoulders cradled and one long leg wrapped around his.  Qui-Gon  
kissed him and reached back out of sight, coming back with his  
palm oiled into a perfect, slick surface.  

Warm, soft lips locked over his and Qui-Gon's tongue slid into  
his mouth, tracing out the small grooves on his teeth and  
reaching back almost to the base of his throat.  In the midst  
of that kiss, one enormous hand closed around his cock and  
began stroking him, at first gently, then gripping harder so  
that he could thrust into it.  Obi-Wan was vaguely aware of his  
whole body bucking into the touch, twisting so hard that it  
must have taken the greatest part of Qui-Gon's strength just to  
hold him down.  Fingers on him, rubbing his flesh and then  
shifting down to roll his balls gently in a big palm.  He was  
crying, he knew he was crying, but any sounds he made were  
vanishing down the older man's throat.  

The kiss never broke off, only shifted occasionally when Obi-  
Wan twisted hard enough to jar them both.  When he came, he  
came shrieking, and even that sound was lost into his Master's  
lungs, just air and the moisture of his mouth and the other.    
He was sticky and shaking and nearly blind from the pleasure,  
and for a long time afterward Qui-Gon simply held him, still  
kissing, and stroking him gently.  A light stroke across his  
cock and balls, a careful finger stroking his anus where he'd  
already been stretched and taken.

They were both a mess, but he didn't have the energy to move,  
and he was too determined to let his partner go.  Eventually,  
when the last aftershocks had run through him, he simply let  
himself sleep, clinging to his Master and listening to the soft  
words the man still poured out to him.

*beautiful   beautiful   love you my Obi-Wan no one has ever  
been as beautiful as perfect as you are    I am not going to  
leave you, love   shh, sleep, it's all right*

Strange that even in his sleep, he was counting Qui-Gon's  
breaths, the numbers sifting through his dreams insistently,  
like something he couldn't let go of.


End file.
